Tuesday, July 31, 2007

My uncle sent me an e-mail from Frimet and Arnold Roth about their murdered daughter and the continuing insane glorification of terrorism. "The parents of a victim of the Jerusalem Sbarro bombing are distributing photos of the girl to counter what they say is the glamorous depiction of one of her killers in a documentary. The HBO documentary, Hot House, examines life inside Israeli jails holding Palestinian prisoners and includes an interview with a female Hamas member serving 16 life sentences for her role in the 2001 bombing of the Jerusalem pizzeria, which killed 15 people. A publicity shot of the bomber appearing on HBO's website and in the New York Times shows a young woman in a head scarf and lipstick, smiling." And, the parents of Malki Chana Roth want you to know, "That female is our child's murderer." Pass along their message, and visit The Malki Foundation in honor of their daughter's memory.

Monday, July 30, 2007

Read Best of the Web Today,which links to this op-ed in (are you ready?) the New York Times: "Here is the most important thing Americans need to understand: We are finally getting somewhere in Iraq, at least in military terms. As two analysts who have harshly criticized the Bush administration’s miserable handling of Iraq, we were surprised by the gains we saw and the potential to produce not necessarily “victory” but a sustainable stability that both we and the Iraqis could live with."

The Israel News Agency is remembering Michael Levin. (This is via Free Republic) "When asked to explain how it's possible that this young man from a Philadelphia suburb could teach Israelis about Zionism, his father has a simple reply: 'Michael was very small in size' - he had to wear weights when parachuting to prevent the wind from blowing him off course - 'he was only 5 foot 6 [167 cm.] and 118 pounds [54 kilos], but he had the heart of a lion. It's a paradigm of what Israel is: Israelis almost see him as a mirror of their own existence - that you don't have to be the biggest to make your mark on the world.'"

Sunday, July 29, 2007

Haveil Havalim #127 is up at Soccer Dad! He has called this the "Sarah the Matriarch edition", for according to the Torah, Sarah lived for 127 years. You will see that Soccer Dad is cleverly basing the theme on phrases associated with Sarah and Avraham.

My sister sent me this Boston Globe op-ed piece called "The silence lifts on Poland's Jews" by Joseph Polak. He writes, "Everyone knew that Poland had turned a corner when in 2001 then-President Aleksander Kwasniewski spoke at the village of Jedwabne. There, on behalf of his country, Kwasniewski apologized for the 1941 massacre of Jedwabne's Jews, who were burned alive by their neighbors with little help from the Germans. In the past, when Poland had spoken of the Holocaust, it saw itself as a victim among victims, and when it spoke about its almost 2 million citizens murdered by the Nazis, it was not referring to its Jews, 3.5 million of whom were also murdered by the Germans.For 60 years Poland was silent when it came to its slaughtered Jews, echoing, if that is the word, the silence of their absence. The Kwasniewski speech finally brought the silence to an official end....Last month, the door that had been pried open by Kwasniewski swung wide with the groundbreaking for a Museum of the History of Polish Jews, to be erected on the grounds of the former Warsaw Ghetto....Omnipresent in Poland is a loss so massive that its proportions are not manageable -- almost not imaginable. Not just the numbers, but the humanity gone -- the mothers, the children, the schools, the clubs, the communities; hundreds, perhaps thousands of villages, emptied. Poland, for the most part, was not the murderer, yet death oozes everywhere from its pores. A mass grave of children here, a death camp there; the wind, blowing through decapitated, wearied frames of synagogues; bathhouses for family purity and bath houses that were gas chambers; the wind howling, through abandoned cemeteries and leveled ghettos, of an all-embracing sadness that will not subside and for which there is no consolation. Visitors will come to the museum, appreciate its energy and intentions and displays, and then ask -- so where are these Jews? Does anybody here miss them? This silence, this great absence into which the visitor leaving the museum will surely be slammed, will undo the museum's messages, will sabotage its best intentions, will ask: Who here weeps for the Jews besides the Jews? Indeed, unless it can make Poland itself cry for its murdered Jews, the museum will represent a dry nostalgia, an exercise in historical anthropology, with the Jews as Poland's Mayas."

Saturday, July 28, 2007

The American Thinker discusses Israel's release of 250 Fatah terrorists: "Mr Olmert said of his decision to release those 250 terrorists: 'I think that this gesture is a fitting one, and not a product of some illusion' [Israelinsider - 8 July2007]. 'Fitting'? - the unconditional release of 250 convicted and sworn enemies of Israel and a brutal slap in the face for the Israeli Defence Forces, police and security services who risk their lives on a daily basis to protect ordinary Israeli civilians from these would be mass murderers?"

I saw this article about Michael Vick and the dogfighting scandal: "Dogfighting case triggers public outrage." How come babies left to die in hot cars receive LESS "public outrage"? I don't see any protests over that, or over rockets fired into Israel, or over the terrible murders of a mother & her daughters in CT.

Friday, July 27, 2007

The Israeli air force flies over Auschwitz at Rubicon3. The latest Watchers Council entries are over at Soccer Dad. And Larry Elder has a letter of gratitude that should have been written by an illegal alien...but was not.

Here's an article about that Democratic YouTube debate. I just hope the Republicans don't stoop to this undignified level. I don't want Presidential candidates to be my buddy; I want them to be my leader!

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Thomas Sowell writes about our country being"morally paralyzed": "'Moral paralysis' is a term that has been used to describe the inaction of France, England and other European democracies in the 1930s, as they watched Hitler build up the military forces that he later used to attack them. It is a term that may be painfully relevant to our own times."

Well, here we go again. Do these bimbos follow a script? I don't care what they do, but I do care that the media finds them worthy of 24 hour a day coverage. Just now, I was trying to find the headlines on TV when Fox News actually had a "news alert". What was it? Lindsay Lohan's father reacts to daughter's arrest. Yes, that's definitely alert material. (Read about this instead, a 9/11 survivor who became a Marine in order to respond to the enemy. This does NOT merit a TV news report.)

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

The Israelis are people you'd least expect to be politically correct, so I could hardly believe my eyes when I read about this outrage via Neal Boortz . Boortz says,"Israel is going to publish a "politically correct" text book for Arab students, saying that the creation of the Jewish state was a tragedy for Palestinians. This just has to be a joke. The real tragedy for Palestinians is that nobody wants them. They serve one purpose for the Arab world ... cannon fodder."

Monday, July 23, 2007

Mitch Albom has written a wonderful, nostalgic column in which characters from our favorite childhood books discuss Harry Potter. "Once, it seemed, there was room for all kinds of kids' books. Tigers and spiders and princes and Indians. But these days, it's all Harry. Harry in print. Harry online. Harry in theaters. Harry in the toy store. Never has a hype machine worked harder to make a big thing bigger. Never has the media so gleefully jumped on a bandwagon of countdowns, hints and contests."

The dying, now dead, Tammy Faye Bakker, appeared on Larry King's show, prompting Blogcritics' Matthew Milam to say what I was thinking. His piece is titled, "If I Was Ill, The Last Place I'd Want To Be Is On Larry King Live", and he writes, "...I probably don't understand that this is television news. They will do what they can do to get ratings and forget the common sense and dignity that should occur to journalists in the media who see a woman like this, solely in order to be in the history books. Who knows, perhaps it's a good thing. But let me turn to those who have probably seen this interview or have someone who is suffering from lung cancer and is somewhere around the stage that Tammy is: would you let someone you know go on television and be interviewed if the person was that ill?" Well, since everyone lives their lives, and now even dies, on TV, I'm not surprised, just disgusted. And I wasn't surprised either to learn that a German TV channel will devote itself entirely to death and dying: "There are shows for cooking, relationships, weddings and property -- why not for dying? A new TV channel in Germany plans to rectify the omission with 24/7 digital death." What has happened to decency, respect, modesty, and dignity in our culture? These qualities have now gone the way of Jerry Springer, Maury Povich, Larry King, and the various TV freak shows.

Saturday, July 21, 2007

Betsy's Page sums up the despicable vote by what Michael Savage refers to as "liberal vermin" against legislation giving protection to "John Does" who report suspicious behavior by possible terrorists. So why do we need a Department of Homeland Security?

The Media Research Center offers yet another example of media bias :"14,000 Dow; ABC: 'There's a Good Deal of Worrisome Economic News'. Repeating the downbeat spin employed when the Dow Jones Industrials passed 13,000 in late April and ABC's reporter warned 'we're actually overdue for a correction,' less than three months later when the Dow closed over 14,000, ABC's World News put the news into a 'yes, but' framework. Fill-anchor Elizabeth Vargas on Thursday night led with the record high close, but fretted that 'there's a good deal of worrisome economic news these days -- from sky-high gas prices to America's gaping trade deficit' and 'yet' she marveled, 'the market keeps marching on.' Reporter John Berman began by emphasizing that though 'the Dow went from 13 to 14,000 in just 3 months,' this occurred 'despite those serious jitters about the U.S. economy: $3 gas, a major housing slump -- a drag on the U.S. economy.'" It seems that the mainstream media continues to downplay any good news occuring during the Bush Administration.

Thursday, July 19, 2007

I bet this guy also gets a slap on the wrist. "A contract employee at a nuclear material cleanup site in Tennessee pleaded not guilty Thursday to charges that he stole classified information about enriching uranium to sell to foreign governments." Oh well.

It sounds like even golf, the civilized sport, the gentleman's game, has now been touched by scandal. Gary Player said that an unnamed golfer has used steroids. Instead of letting rumor and innuendo ruin the game, he should name names and that player should be dealt with.

What a nerve! "A Muslim civil rights group yesterday blamed the Bush administration for promoting 'Islamophobia' and said the 'war on terror' won't stop terrorists." That group is CAIR, and I still haven't heard a word of apology from them for September 11. Meanwhile, this writer, in a great article titled "If We Don't Call Them Names, the Terrorists Win", outlines 5 reasons for the lack of strong moral judgements and verbal outrage when it comes to denouncing these Muslim murderers. This should be required reading.

Monday, July 16, 2007

Here's more proof that the 9/11 deniers who have no decency whatsoever are not only not normal, but also dangerous. Andrea Peyser writes, "This time, they've gone too far. A group of 9/11 conspiracy theorists - whackos who deny that jumbo jets brought down the World Trade Center - is on the attack. But their latest target isn't the government, which they claim destroyed the buildings with explosives. They're using a vicious Internet assault to pick on an elderly widow. 'They're dirty sons of bastards! They are not real men,' feisty Ellen Mariani, 69, told me. Ellen lost her husband aboard United 175 on Sept. 11, 2001."

Here we go again! "President Bush on Monday announced an international conference this fall to include Israel, the Palestinian Authority and some of their Arab neighbors to help restart Mideast peace talks and review progress in building democratic institutions." But as always, I have to agree with Israpundit: "There is no diplomatic solution. There is only a military solution".

Sunday, July 15, 2007

Boker tov, Boulder! reports on Muslim Congressman Keith Ellison's comparison of President Bush to Hitler. Naturally, this has hardly made news here, but, as Boker tov's Anne Lieberman points out, "Can you imagine if the shoe were on the other foot, and Bush had compared Black Muslim Congressman Ellison to Hitler? The AP and al Reuters would be all over it."

Soccer Dad has announced that Haveil Havalim #125 is up at Yid With Lid, who is referring to this version as Haveil Havalim #50,000. Why? Because it was Yid With Lid's 50th birthday, and HH#125 is his 1,000th post. So go there right away and read all the great posts. (Remember, if you'd like to host a future edition of HH, or if you just have some praise for this great Jewish blog carnival, contact Soccer Dad David Gerstman at dhgerstman@hotmail.com)

Saturday, July 14, 2007

Atlas Shrugs reports on the latest incredible idiocy by the U.K.'s new Prime Minister: "Brown's Blackout on Truth, Freedom and Churchill. Holy Shia. Brown is a jihadi! The UK is soooooooo screwed. The greatest statesman of all time banned from classrooms. UNFATHOMABLE." "The Madness of Brown Daily Express: Gordon Brown’s politically correct onslaught intensifed last night as compulsory teaching of the life of Sir Winston Churchill was dropped. A new school curriculum, unveiled as part of the Prime Minister’s barrage of initiatives, also scrapped the mandatory study of dictators Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin. It was instantly branded “madness” by critics. Instead, secondary school pupils will be taught classes in global warming, healthy eating, Arabic and Urdu. And they will get five-minute 'attention-grabbing' lessons in subjects like French and mental arithmetic following claims that today’s youngsters cannot concentrate for long." Once again, a complete lack of common sense. Can you just imagine this happening here? Drop the study of George Washington and be taught Mexican culture instead.

Every time I hear a reporter asking, "Do you really believe Al Qaeda is dangerous?" or "Do you really believe Al Qaeda may attack us this summer?", I wonder how they could have already forgotten what happened on September 11. This video may remind them.

Friday, July 13, 2007

I just heard about this wonderful story on WCPE, a classical music station here in North Carolina: "The Stradivari of Ramadi: Some Americans in Iraq spend the off-duty hours on their game machines; others keep blogs or work on their abs and pecs. Sgt. Geoffrey Allison made violins." It's quite a story.

Yesterday, Yid With Lid asked Has Anybody Seen Ehud, Eldad, or Gilad? . "One year ago today Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev joined Gilad Shalit as prisoners of Islamic Terrorists...at least we think that is the case. Hezbollah says they are alive and in their Hands but there has been no communication from them, no pictures or Red Cross visits--no word from to their families that they are OK.....Each of the kidnappings were made without provocation and on Israeli soil. Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev were kidnapped under the watchful eyes of the UN. Other kidnappings during during this year provoked world outrage they were released, two Fox broadcasters and the BBC's Mr. Johnston (who after his release took a victory tour thanking every terrorist he could find). Where is the outrage for Ehud, Eldad, and Gilad?" Read it all. There are biographies of the three boys, as well as an invitation to attend a rally on their behalf on July 16.

Neil Cavuto had a segment about the great economy and the media's reluctance to trumpet this good news: "Wall Street ended an extraordinary and record-setting week Friday by surging higher again, sending the Standard & Poor's 500 index past a trading high set in March 2000 and thrusting the Dow Jones industrial past 13,900 for the first time." He asked viewers to e-mail him and tell him how the media was covering this news, and to nobody's surprise, many news outlets are either burying the news, not covering it at all, or mentioning it only in context to the war in Iraq. I really think the mainstream media prefers bad news to good news from this administration.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

I wonder how our wonderful mainstream media will spin this story (if it makes the news at all, that is): "The Congressional Human Rights Caucus (CHRC) of the US legislature is set to hold a first-of-its-kind hearing next week on the hundreds of thousands of Jews who were forced to flee their homes in Arab countries as a result of the Arab-Israeli conflict. The July 19 hearing in Washington DC, under the heading 'Jewish Refugees from Arab Countries: Truth, Justice, and Reconciliation,' is to be hosted by the CHRC in conjunction with B’nai Brith International and Justice for Jews from Arab Countries. It will be the first time that the US Congress will hear testimony on the issue of Jewish refugees from Arab countries."

When I read things like this, it makes my blood boil: "Palestinian Imam Equates Jews to AIDS". As Bill Levinson at Israpundit asks, "Does any sane person still believe that Israel can have peace with them?"

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Smooth Stone points out this 5-minute long video from UN Watch, which "offers a glimpse into how the UN's highest human rights body—dominated by the worst abusers of human rights—is tragically being turned on its head, to attack democracies, destroy mechanisms of human rights protection, and assault the very idea of human rights." It's frightening and outrageous to see how things have changed since the original United Nations Charter in 1945.

I just heard that Lady Bird Johnson died. I loved her -- she was a true lady, very quiet and gentle, but powerful in her own way. You never heard anything bad about her, and you never heard her utter a bad word about anyone. She was everything that Hillary Clinton is not.

A co-worker forwarded this video around my office today. I've seen many beautiful "Support the Troops" presentations over the years, but this one has to be one of the most touching of all. If after seeing this you want to send a letter of support, you can e-mail the Marines at RCT-6lettersfromh@gcemnf-wiraq.usmc.mil, or go here.

Monday, July 09, 2007

Via Andrew Sullivan, the top 10 useful Yiddish words. I still count Leo Rosten's "The Joys of Yiddish" among my favorite books. Once I lent it to some goyische co-workers, and I greatly enjoyed their good-hearted but mangled attempts to use the language.

Kathryn Jean Lopez repeats an increasingly familiar theme: that political correctness is hampering our resolve in the war on terror. She says, "We in the West face a grave threat from militant Islam, and an even graver threat from our propensity to ignore or redefine Islamic fascism. This is especially true when we adopt politically correct terms to refer to our enemy." Will people still insist on referring to them as "disaffected youth" or "Asians" when they kill 5,000 or 10,000 innocents the next time?

Sunday, July 08, 2007

Haveil Havalim #124 is up at V'HeChadash Yitkadesh. But Soccer Dad is in a quandry, as he can't think of a creative name for this edition of his wonderful Jewish blog carnival. E-mail him at dhgerstman@hotmail.com if you have any clever ideas, or if you'd like to host a future edition of Haveil Havalim.

Here are 2 good items on Olmert's outrageous release of 250 Palestinian prisoners. First, Israpundit says "Olmert has no shame in selling us this crap." And Little Green Footballs' headline is "Israel on Fast Track to Appeasement". He writes, "At this point in history, after Oslo, after countless suicide bombings and murders perpetrated by the very people Olmert is lauding as 'moderates,' there’s absolutely no excuse for this kind of delusional thinking. The inmates truly are running the asylum."

This news proves that the media never misses an opportunity to attack Mayor Giuliani or downplay his achievements: "Rudy Giuliani never misses an opportunity to remind people about his track record in fighting crime as mayor of New York City from 1994 to 2001. 'I began with the city that was the crime capital of America,' Giuliani, now a candidate for president, recently told Fox's Chris Wallace. 'When I left, it was the safest large city in America. I reduced homicides by 67 percent. I reduced overall crime by 57 percent.' Although crime did fall dramatically in New York during Giuliani's tenure, a broad range of scientific research has emerged in recent years to show that the mayor deserves only a fraction of the credit that he claims. The most compelling information has come from an economist in Fairfax who has argued in a series of little-noticed papers that the "New York miracle" was caused by local and federal efforts decades earlier to reduce lead poisoning." Funny how this is only coming to light now that the Mayor is in the running for President. Plus, from all the brutal stories I've seen lately, it looks like crime is getting worse, not less.

Saturday, July 07, 2007

This is a good read by Wesley Pruden about Bill Clinton's displeasure with President Bush's commutation of Libby's sentence: "Who would have thought that such a quaint and happy place like Arkansas, where nothing much happens to torment the razorbacks, disturb the boll weevils or curdle the barbecue sauce, could furnish the modern definition of 'chutzpah.'"

Friday, July 06, 2007

Here's more news about the peaceful Muslim doctors: "JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Documents seized from group of 45 Muslim doctors threatening to use car bombings and other attacks in the United States said their first target would be "the naval base that gives shelter to the ship Kenney," The Telegraph of London reported Thursday." Oh well! Remember, the war on terror is just "a bumper sticker", according to John Edwards.(Above cartoon by Cox & Forkum via Little Green Footballs)

Here's more proof that today's "children" are not children as we remember them: "11-Year-Old Girl Charged With DUI, Led Cops On High-Speed Chase", and this even worse story : "Police: Girls, 10, 12, Kidnap Baby For Ransom; Ransom Note Demanded $200,000". There will certainly be attempts to spin these stories as "just kids having fun". But these are not kids, and these are not pranks. These are the superpredators they warned about so many years ago.

Thursday, July 05, 2007

My pal Diane and I have been discussing this terrible tragedy in Kansas where a woman lay dying of stab wounds while shoppers continued to shop. One woman used her cell phone to take a picture of the victim -- but did not bother to call 9-1-1. This reminds me of that recent case where a woman lay dying in a hospital ER while a janitor mopped up around her. The Wichita Eagle columnist wonders if it's criminal to see a victim and not do anything to help. My answer is yes. And if you can't prosecute apathetic people, the least you can do is show their faces and names in the newspaper with a caption such as "These people stood by and did nothing". What a contrast between people like that and Wesley Autrey, who risked his own life to rescue a man who'd fallen onto New York subway tracks!

This doctor says, "The thought of physicians treating patients while secretly plotting to kill innocent people sickens and angers me on a new level. It is the ultimate betrayal of the trust placed in them to use their hands for healing, their intellects for diagnosis , and their demeanors to bring comfort to the sick. As a Muslim physician, I believe the gifts I have been given are entrusted to me by God for the purpose of serving humanity."

Tuesday, July 03, 2007

Here's a good article about Senator Norm Coleman, a longtime critic of the United Nations and its anti-Israel policies: "One might think that the moral bankruptcy of the U.N. would be obvious to everyone in Washington, but it is not so. In Congress, Norm Coleman is the most effective advocate for sanity in the U.N., and for responsibility in our relationship with that organization."

I am hoping that this is only a very bad joke. If not, Britain's new Prime Minister has had his credibility last less than a week. "Gordon Brown has banned ministers from using the word 'Muslim' in connection with the terrorism crisis.The Prime Minister has also instructed his team - including new Home Secretary Jacqui Smith - that the phrase 'war on terror' is to be dropped. The shake-up is part of a fresh attempt to improve community relations and avoid offending Muslims, adopting a more "consensual" tone than existed under Tony Blair. ..."

Here's a good column on apologists for Muslim terror: "Attacks on the West from the inside will not stop so long as liberal apologists continue to produce justifications for fundamentalist Muslims who confuse their right to enjoy the liberty of the West with a need to confiscate the rights of everyone else."

This Dennis Prager article suggests Americans have a July 4 seder to bring back the great rituals we now lack in all our national holidays thanks to political correctness. "National memory dies without national ritual. And without a national memory, a nation dies. That is the secret at the heart of the Jewish people's survival that the American people must learn if they are to survive. When Jews gather at the Passover Seder -- and this is the most widely observed Jewish holiday -- they recount the exodus from Egypt, an event that occurred 3,200 years ago. We Americans have difficulty keeping alive the memory of events that happened 231 years ago."

Kesher Talk is running a contest: "The Jerusalem Post continues its coverage of the Latin Mass controversy, with a story that states, 'The text of a "Motu Proprio" (papal decision) regarding the revival of a controversial Latin mass will be made public this week, The Jerusalem Post has learned. Vatican officials stressed that the current text, which formerly called Jews "perfidious," contains no derogatory reference to Jews.' On one level I'm relieved, but on another I'm saddened that I won't find a colorful term for Jews in the Latin mass. That suggests a Kesher Talk contest -- what's your favorite epithet for Jews? With perfidious on the way out of the Latin Mass, where can we turn for an invigorating dose of oppobrium? Send us your favorite terms. These ground rules apply, to force creativity. The terms CANNOT use the words "Christ" or "Nazi" in any form or gerund. On the other hand, terms in languages other than English are welcome, to show the range of the rich linguistic heritage of Jew hatred." I would have to include the lovely phrases "you people" and "your people", which I have heard many times.

Sunday, July 01, 2007

This is a headline I like to see: "PM defiant over 'al-Qaeda threat'". He said "Britain will not yield". Winston Churchill said in 1940, "Even though large tracts of Europe and many old and famous States have fallen or may fall into the grip of the Gestapo and all the odious apparatus of Nazi rule, we shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender, and even if, which I do not for a moment believe, this Island or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our Empire beyond the seas, armed and guarded by the British Fleet, would carry on the struggle, until, in God's good time, the New World, with all its power and might, steps forth to the rescue and the liberation of the old." Just replace the words "Gestapo" and "Nazi" with "Al Qaeda" and "Jihadist", and the sentiment is the same today.